DollarRalph

Great review.

Sometimes when the world seems very depressing, it's because you're depressed. Much of the time, how you view things and what you expect has more to do with how you look at the world than the actual state of the world around you.

It was very common on Long Island, NY in the late 60s & early 70s. Seemed like there were a bunch of prolific serial killers then and a few preyed on male hitchhikers and that seemed to be the beginning of end of hitchhiking. Not that many girls hitched rides even back then, that was always seen as pretty dangerous. It also seemed like the political polarization of the late 60s & early 70s (the Vietnam era) also reduced trust of strangers. Seemed like there was a new risk that someone wouldn't like your political views or length of a guy's hair, etc. and the ride might get uncomfortable. I hitched a lot but never had any serious problems -- a couple lousy drivers but no accidents and one guy who threatened me but he was just trying to scare me, not actually violent. And that's over probably 400+ rides. I'd pick people up too after I had my own car but stopped when that started to feel dangerous too.

Yes, that's an impressively good, useful list!